Montreal, Nov 11, 2018, 10:37 pm (action for reuniting; after being apart from your loved ones)

Action notes: My sweeties flew into Montreal this evening, to spend some time with me while I am in residence here. I haven’t seen them in a while. After unpacking and eating, I asked if I could perform Yoko Ono‘s Beat Piece with one of them. The score, written in 1963 and published in her 1964 collection Grapefruit, instructs me to “Listen to a heart beat.” S said yes. I brought him into the other room, laid him down on the bed, and, with my left ear on his chest, listened to his heartbeat. It was less regular than I expected. Not that I was hearing arrhythmia or anything. But I was expecting a pretty even “thuh-thunk….thuh-thunk.” I don’t know why, and I can’t remember the last time I just lay, listening to someone’s heartbeat for an extended period of time — maybe my 20s? In any case, the sound was much more…mobile…than I had anticipated. “thuh-thunk….thuh-thunk…thunka-thunk-thunk…thuka-thunk.” I imagine the syncopation of a fish flopping in a bucket after it has been caught. Some regularity, but lots of variation.

Action constraints: While the instruction is simply to listen, as we hadn’t seen each other in a while, I couldn’t help but hug as I was listening, which, I guess, isn’t really a constraint as this altered the speed and quality of the heartbeat, perhaps causing the variety I was listening to. 🙂

 

bodyre-performance